Tuesday, January 13, 2015

What Boehner must Do

We all know the
attempt to oust Republican House Speaker, John Boehner, failed. What many may
not realize, is that it only barely failed. At first, Boehner seemed to be
responding with indignation. Two of the “rogue” congressmen were removed from
their committee appointments, with threats that more would be punished. But,
based on several articles on Breightbart, the Blaze, Newsmax and others,
Boehner seems to be striking a more conciliatory tone, lamenting that he had
once been the 8th most Conservative Congressman in Congress, and
wondering how he was now considered “establishment.”-1)

Breightbart points
out at least six major breaks from Conservative philosophy. On the 2011Budget
Control Act, the 2011 Disaster Relief Funding Bill, Boehner’s 2012 purge of
Conservatives from important committee appointments, The mishandled 2013
Obamacare Government Shutdown, The 2013 Ryan-Murray Budget Deal, and of course,
the fact that Boehner has been actively advocating for amnesty. -2. Ben Shapiro
can break down each of these failures better than I, but sufficed to say that
in each of these major bills or policies, Obama has gotten the farm, and then
some, from Boehner. Unlike Gingrich, who at least dragged Bill Clinton to the
middle and had major Conservative accomplishments as a result, Boehner seems
incapable of moving Obama in any direction on any issue. And that is why there
was an attempt to depose him.

With Boehner
seemingly wanting to fix the divisions within the party, there are a few things
I would like to put forward that he needs to lead out on:

1)No gas tax increase. Already, Gas taxes make up
almost 50 cents of every gallon of gasoline purchased by consumers. True, that
is when you combine state taxes with federal taxes, but even so, gas prices
have been front and center to the economic crisis that we have been facing.
Much of the housing market bubble popping can be attributed to the gas price
shocks we experienced at the same time. Gas prices didn’t just rise gradually,
they exploded on us, and otherwise responsible people like me, found ourselves
unable to pay our bills based on our budgets. Soon, we had less money for the
superfluous things, like gadgets and electronics, and we had to spend less on
food, dates and everything in general.

What economic growth we have been experiencing this last quarter can,
likewise, be attributed to the collapsing gas prices. People have money again,
and while it is too late for me to avoid bankruptcy, if gas prices remain low,
it will certainly help me, and millions of other poor Americans, to stabilize
our finances. The federal government, and the anti-tax party, no less, want to
increase the gas tax by 12 cents a gallon. This will reverse the growth we are
experiencing. Time permitting, I will try to do a video later explaining this
in greater detail, but the same rules that govern income tax, and corporate
tax, governs gasoline also. I don’t care that it hasn’t gone up in 18 years, no
one on Main Street, or Wall Street does. Increasing the gas tax will surely
increase our costs of living, and the Chamber of Commerce’s costs of doing
business. Sure, there is panic on Wall Street over these lower prices, but if
they hold on, other prices will start to fall, including the cost of building
and maintaining infrastructure.

2)Stop the Anti-Tea Party talk. 2012 happened
because the party was divided amongst ourselves. In my book, The Great
Compromise: Getting Past The Emotional Nonsense Dividing America (which you can pick up here), I put forward
three major factions I blamed for our losses, but made clear that the most
damage was done by the Moderate Establishment. After all, instead of reaching out to
Conservative activists and trying to understand their concerns, they bludgeoned the
Grass Roots Activists at every opportunity. They spent more time in the 2012
election cycle trying to beat the Tea Party than they did trying to beat Barack
Obama. Those disaffected activists stayed home, and then the Establishment had
the audacity to berate and belittle them for that too! It’s as if the
Establishment was saying, “I don’t want to listen to you ‘wacko birds’, but how
dare you refuse to vote for me!” It’s a sign of obvious insanity.What's worse is that there are now some establishment types who have taken to making a game out of sticking
their thumb in the eyes of Conservative activists. Some even take it so far as
to post inflammatory messages on facebook, just to annoy the people who don’t vote
Democrat, and whose trust is being betrayed. It’s up to John Boehner to put a
stop to this.

3)Never give up on Obamacare, never give in. If we
cannot repeal it, three specific aspects of it must be repealed. The Individual
mandate, and the tax penalties associated with it, because I am not the only
one who is simply not making enough to buy healthcare, period. The Employer
Mandate, because many small businesses cannot afford it, period. Finally, the
30 hour work week needs to go back to 40 hours, because we already cannot
afford health care, and not being able to work 40 hours a week will only make
it worse.

This cannot wait for the upcoming Supreme Court review. We already know
that Justice Roberts back stabbed us in the past, essentially by re-interpreting
the law as a tax, even though Obama insisted it wasn't. I do not trust SCOTUS
to do the right thing. Even if Obama vetoes any action we take, we much
persist.

4) Abandon
Amnesty. Outside the Democratic Party, and the Chamber of Commerce, no one really
wants it, as reflected by poll after poll, where as many as 75% of the
population are opposed to Amnesty in any form. Additionally, there is no
evidence to suggest that pushing Amnesty through will win over enough of the undocumented immigrant vote to replace the votes that will be lost for doing it. In fact,
most polls show that these are Democratic Demographics, and while I support
trying to win them over, they know when they are being pandered to, and won’t
switch sides for anything other than us converting them to our belief system. I
support minority outreach because I believe Conservative Principals will
benefit them. That is how we will win their votes, doing genuine outreach. That
is the policy that will return Boehner and the GOP to the good graces of the people.
Genuine outreach to minority communities, and enforcement of our current laws.
The problem isn't that the system is broke. The problem is that it is ignored.

So we have given 6 major Boehner screw ups, and only four things to
address to fix it. If nothing else, I hope that demonstrates that we, who serve
as Boehner’s critics, are not unreasonable. It won’t take much to get him back
on our good side, and if he’s serious about it, we’d be happy to reconcile, if
he is willing to at least do these few things.

About Me

I am a Libertarian leaning Conservative in the vein of Hans Herman Hoppe, and FA Hayek. I am the author of "The Great Compromise: Getting Past The Emotional Nonsense Dividing America." I am absolutely opposed to government growth and interference in free markets. However I am not fanatical about my beliefs and in fact try my best to approach politics with a "moderate tone." I like to write about religion, entertainment and politics and write material designed to encourage individualism, entrepreneurship and free market solutions to solve the problems our State and Federal governments keep creating.